Capitol Hill Forum 2003
A Win-Win Agenda: Shaping New Opportunities
in International Agriculture

11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
February 13, 2003

Speakers

Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur represents the Toledo area's Ninth Congressional District in Northwest Ohio. She is currently serving her eleventh term in the U.S. House of Representatives, is the senior Democratic woman in Congress and is the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. Kaptur holds a bachelor of arts degree in history from the University of Wisconsin and a master’s degree in urban planning from the University of Michigan. She practiced as a city and regional planner before seeking public office. She also serves on the on the VA, HUD and Independent Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee, which has allowed her to pursue her strong interests in economic growth and new technology, community rebuilding, and veterans. Demonstrating international leadership through diplomatic contributions to the Middle East Peace process, Rep. Kaptur is responsible for directing the first surplus farm commodities in 1999 to support the peace process in the Middle East in Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian Authority. She remains dedicated to democratic institution-building globally and has spearheaded charitable efforts to benefit Ukraine and Vietnam.

J. B. Roberts, Past District Governor, served as International Chairman of Rotary International's Hunger Task Force in 2001-2002 and currently serves as advisor to the Rotary International President. J.B. is also Chairman of Hunger Plus, Inc. a 501c3 organization that has sent food to every continent in the world except Antarctica. He brings passionate leadership to Rotary's emerging broad-based, grassroots, worldwide efforts to end hunger. J.B. is a sixth generation Texan from Plainview, Texas. He graduated from Baylor University in 1950 with a bachelor of business administration degree and received a direct commission in the United States Air Force in 1951 in the Office of Special Investigation (OSI). He retired from his own realty firm, J. B. Roberts and Associates, in 1992. During his presidency of the Plainview Rotary Club, it was recognized as the "Outstanding Club of the Year" in District 5730 and J.B. was personally selected as Rotarian of the Year. In 1999, he received Rotary International's prestigious Citation for Meritorious Service.

Andrew Natsios was sworn in on May 1, 2001, as administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). President Bush has also appointed him Special Coordinator for International Disaster Assistance and Special Humanitarian Coordinator for the Sudan. Natsios is a graduate of Georgetown University and Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government where he received a master's degree in public administration. Natsios has served previously at USAID, as director of the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance and as assistant administrator for the Bureau for Food and Humanitarian Assistance. Before assuming his present position, Natsios was chairman and chief executive officer of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority and had responsibility for managing the Big Dig, the largest public works project in U.S. history. Prior to that he served as secretary for administration and finance for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and vice president of World Vision U.S. From 1987 to 1989, he was executive director of the Northeast Public Power Association in Milford, Massachusetts. Natsios served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1975 to 1987 and was named legislator of the year by the Massachusetts Municipal Association (1978), the Massachusetts Association of School Committees (1986), and Citizens for Limited Taxation (1986). He also was chairman of the Massachusetts Republican State Committee for seven years.

Gary Martin has served for two years as President and Chief Executive Officer of the North American Export Grain Association (NAEGA,) the association of US grain and oilseed exporters. Among several related activities, he serves on the USDA/USTR Agricultural Policy Trade Advisory Committee, he is an advisor to the National Council on Food and Agricultural Policy, and the American Soybean Association/United Soybean Board Competition Task Force. Before assuming the presidency of NAEGA, Mr. Martin had been a NAEGA Board Director and officer, representing Farmland Industries, Inc., where he served from 1993 to 1999 as Director of Trade and International Relations, Director of Grain Marketing, and Founder and President of Farmland Graños in Mexico. Mr. Martin was also Director of Business and Policy for Agriculture at Kimball and Associates, International in McLean, Virginia. From 1990 to 1992 Mr. Martin served the Administration of George H.W. Bush at the US Department if Agriculture as Deputy Administrator of Commodity Operations and as an officer of the Commodity Credit Corporation. In the first year of the Clinton Administration, from 1992 to 1993, he served as an advisor to the Special Ambassador to the former Soviet Union at the US Department of State. Gary Martin earned a bachelor of science degree in agricultural economics, with highest honors, from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana. He is also a graduate of the University of Missouri Institute of Cooperative Leadership.

Dr. Rodney Brown, Deputy Under Secretary, Research, Education and Extension, USDA, is a national leader in agricultural teaching, research, extension and international programs and believes strongly in the importance of these programs to ensure that American agriculture maintains its crucial position in the world. Dr. Brown was raised on a dairy farm in Coalville, Utah. After receiving degrees from Brigham Young University, Utah State University and North Carolina State University, Dr. Brown spent two years as a research scientist at Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. Since then, he has been a faculty member, department head, dean and interim vice president for research at Utah State University. During this time, he spent a year in England developing biological testing procedures for foods. Dr. Brown recently chaired the Board on Agriculture of National Association of State Universities and Land- Grant Colleges (NASULGC), and helped form formal links with the Inter-university Council on Agriculture in Europe. Dr. Brown also assisted in the founding of The Arab American University at Jenin.